1. Field of Invention
This invention relates to the cultivation of mycelium under artificial, sterile conditions to create a consumer product which permits targeted, non-electrical supplementation of carbon dioxide to indoor gardening environments, and more particularly to a consumer product resulting from human intervention and accessories to extend the viability of products dependent upon organisms thereby enhancing long-term shelving, shipping, and storage options.
2. Description of the Related Art
In indoor growing environments, adequate levels of light, water, and nutrients must be artificially supplied for good plant growth. Carbon dioxide (CO2) is one of these nutrients. Even though CO2 is one of the most abundant gases in the atmosphere, the focused delivery of carbon dioxide to indoor growing environments is a consistent struggle for growers as plants are constantly depleting the supply restricted by the enclosure.
The percentage of CO2 in the air without any enrichment is defined in terms of ambient carbon dioxide levels. Ambient CO2 levels typically hover around 400 parts per million (ppm) or 775 mg/m3. Indoor plants can quickly convert this CO2 through photosynthesis and deplete available CO2. When CO2 levels fall to around 150 ppm or 291 mg/m3, the rate of plant growth quickly declines. Enriching the air in the indoor growing area to around 1200-1500 ppm or 2325-2907 mg/m3 can have a dramatic, positive effect on plant growth. In such conditions, growth rates typically increase by up to thirty percent (30%). Stems and branches grow faster, and the cells of those areas are more densely packed. Stems can carry more weight without bending or breaking CO2 enriched plants have more flowering sites due to the increased branching effect.
The importance of CO2 enrichment to enhance plant growth is even greater when other important natural resources are present in only suboptimal quantities. When other nutrients are in such short supply, plants cannot survive under ambient CO2 concentrations. Elevated levels of CO2 often enable such vegetation to grow and successfully reproduce where they would otherwise die. One of the reasons that plants are able to respond to indoor CO2 enrichment in the face of significant shortages of light, water, and nutrients is that CO2 enriched plants generally have more extensive and active root systems, which allows them to more thoroughly explore larger volumes of soil in search of the nutrients they need.
Carbon dioxide enrichment also affects the way a plant can tolerate high temperatures. At the highest air temperatures encountered by plants, CO2 enrichment has been demonstrated to be even more valuable. It can often mean the difference between a plant living and dying, as enhancement typically enables plants to maintain positive carbon exchange rates in situations where plants growing under ambient CO2 levels and environments with nominal CO2 levels exhibit negative rates that ultimately lead to their demise.
Under normal growing conditions, water rises from the plant roots and is released by the stomata during transpiration. CO2 enrichment affects transpiration by causing the stomata to partially close. This slows down the loss of water vapor into the air. Foliage on CO2 enriched plants is much thicker and slower to wilt than foliage on plants grown without CO2 enrichment.
CO2 plays an important part in other vital plant and animal processes, such as photosynthesis and respiration. Photosynthesis is the process by which plants make carbohydrates. During photosynthesis the chlorophyll in the chloroplasts of green plants convert sunlight, CO2 and water into food compounds, such as glucose and carbohydrates, and oxygen (O2). This process, also called carbon assimilation, has the following chemical reaction:6CO2+6H2O→C6H12O6+6O2.Plants growing indoors under artificial light often lack enough CO2 to efficiently photosynthesize. Plants can quickly use up the available CO2 and convert it to O2, a waste by-product of photosynthesis. When plants are able to access needed CO2, the result is larger plants with larger yields.
Because plants are shown to thrive when enriched with CO2 and because plants growing indoors under artificial light often lack enough CO2, the use of products to supplement CO2 have become prevalent. While CO2 enrichment for indoor gardening is nothing new, growers have recently been looking for new, lower cost alternatives to expensive propane burners and CO2 bottle systems. With fuel costs continuing to rise, propane use for CO2 will soon be obsolete. And while indoor gardening is not new, a growing trend of “be your own farmer” has caused the industry to explode.
Growers have attempted to boost CO2 available to indoor growing environments from many varied sources. In the past, carbon dioxide has been supplied to indoor production facilities, indoor growing environments, or greenhouses by using specialized CO2 generators to burn carbon-based fuels such as natural gas, propane, and kerosene, or directly piping it from tanks of pure CO2. These sources have had disadvantages including: high costs of production, increased temperature or moisture in localized areas and to particular plants, disease or contamination as may occur from incomplete combustion or the presence of foreign chemicals or by-products. Due to these and other disadvantages, prior inventions have proposed that fossil fuels should no longer be used for indoor gardening.
Even with the goal to cease use of fossil fuels, problems persist with CO2 production methods currently in use. Of course, utilizing fossil fuels is a wasteful process when producing CO2. But with the increasing focus on becoming more “green” and decreasing costs, the continuous use of electricity must be avoided. Use and reuse must be prioritized. Initial set-up and maintenance costs must be reduced. Prior inventions have mandated the use of an electrical mechanism or an electrically activated pump or fan to move the CO2. The ongoing use of electricity and permanent parts such as pumps do not sufficiently decrease the cost of operation for the CO2 production systems. Such systems also need refills and do not provide a recyclable source of CO2. Because those CO2 production methods require the use of continuous electricity, they are not environmentally friendly. Furthermore, increased energy prices make all of these prior CO2 production systems undesirable. A need exists for a method of boosting CO2 production in indoor growing spaces without requiring additional, artificial energy inputs.
The trend toward smaller, indoor growing spaces creates demand for low-cost, environmentally friendly products. Small, penny-wise operations, similar to larger operations, are looking to save money and avoid spending thousands of dollars to be able to supply their grow space with CO2. With these small operations in mind, some alternatives have been developed, including inventions which have sought to supplement CO2 through the use of compost, yeast, dry ice, pads, or buckets. While trying to utilize natural processes, these inventions have failed to sufficiently supply CO2 and meet other demands of indoor growing environments.
First, the utilization of compost for CO2 has been used for years but with some drawbacks. The composting of organic matter results in bacteria breaking down the organic matter and as a result, one of the by-products is CO2. Many large scale greenhouses have used composting rooms adjacent to the growing greenhouse to provide CO2 for their crop. CO2 is pumped from one room into the other byway of circulation fans. Besides requiring large amounts of space and energy for circulation fans, composting so close to growing areas can attract insects that could potentially damage valuable crops.
Next, the process of mixing sugars, water, and yeast has been used to produce CO2. The yeast eats the sugar and releases carbon dioxide and alcohol as by-products. The process requires precise control of water temperature. Water too hot will kill the yeast and if the water is too cold, the yeast will not activate. While the use of yeast to supplement CO2 is somewhat simple and inexpensive, it does have some drawbacks. It also requires a lot of space, presents an odor problem, and requires repeated, time consuming re-mixing every 4-5 days.
Dry ice is a solid or frozen form of carbon dioxide and it releases CO2 when exposed to the atmosphere. As it melts it is converted from a solid to a gas. Dry ice has no liquid stage, which makes it easy to work with and requires little clean-up. However, dry ice can be expensive for long-term use and it is difficult to store because it is constantly melting away. Using insulated containers can slow the melting process, but it cannot be stopped.
CO2 pads were developed from products used in the food storage industry, primarily the pads used for fresh food storage. The presence of CO2 helps prevent decay, so these pads are used to increase the shelf life of meat, fish, and poultry. CO2 is produced by the pads using sodium bicarbonate and citric acid, also known as baking soda and vinegar. For activation, the CO2 pads must be wet and since they dry out quickly, water or moisture must be reapplied every few days. It is suggested to replace them every two weeks. The use of pads requires continued attention to ensure the pads do not dry out and the area they can impact is limited. They also require harmful waste to be deposited into the environment.
Additional products also utilize other naturally occurring biological processes such as respiration to supplement CO2 to plants. As has been understood for years, organisms breakdown carbons and digest organic materials resulting in the production of CO2. Those organisms includes bacteria, fungi, and all animals. Humans, animals and fungi, in turn, convert food compounds by combining food with oxygen to release carbon dioxide as well as energy for growth and other life activities. This respiration process, the reverse of photosynthesis, has the following chemical reaction:C6H12O6+6O2→6CO2+6H2O.
Fungi, commonly known as mushrooms, and their saprobe relatives perform a vital function in the availability of carbon dioxide and other elements through these processes. As is evident in each reaction, plants and animals use carbon in their respective life and energy cycles. Plants develop through photosynthesis, a process wherein plants use energy from the sun and carbon dioxide to produce carbohydrates, especially cellulose. Animals consume carbohydrates. The waste and non-living organic bodies resulting from these processes are decomposed by the fungi saprobes. These saprobes get energy and nourishment by biochemical decomposition processes, digesting dead or decaying organic matter in the soil. The fungi excrete digestive enzymes and other chemicals directly onto a food source, which induces the matter to break down for consumption by the organism. The fungi then absorb the consumable products. Some fungi utilize aerobic respiration, which as shown above, is the breakdown of carbohydrates with oxygen into carbon dioxide and water. Others use various anaerobic processes that do not require oxygen, but these processes produce much less energy. Actually, most fungi are capable of doing either, depending on the soil conditions.
The first products which sought to use biological processes of fungi to artificially enhance CO2 to indoor growers were buckets. The buckets offered a non-sterile, mushroom-based CO2 system that utilized technology from the Agaricus or button mushroom industry. The bucket required electricity and a pump to distribute CO2 due to the substrate's less aggressive production of CO2. Short life span and expensive re-fills made this choice undesirable and buckets are nearly extinct in the CO2 supplementation market. The disposal of these heavy-duty, plastic buckets is creating a further impact on the environment.
Since the present inventors' products have arrived on the market, other vendors have sought out means to create their own mushroom CO2 bags. Mushroom CO2 bags appear similar to the present invention but have many, and critical shortcomings which make them substantially less effective, if not inoperative. Some competing mushroom bags tout that they can be partially opened in order to take advantage of an added ability to grow mushrooms right from the bag. This proposed functionality adds unwanted risk for contamination of an indoor garden environment. Opening the bag to allow the mushrooms to grow also compromises the environment inside the bag. Yet, if these bags are allowed to remain closed, mushroom fruiting bodies will form inside, and when not removed those fruiting bodies can create an unsightly mess and the potential for reduced garden health. These shortcomings are further exasperated by the fact that these knock-off CO2 mushroom bags can supply CO2 supplementation for only 2-3 months.